Equal Oppurtunity

I think this amendment brings up a pretty fine line between doing the best for our country and not being discriminatory. It's really hard to make up a law for this because it varies from each personal situation. I think that a person who is not born in America should be able to be President, but have to follow many rules in order to be eligible, such as number of years of citizenship, age, etc. I think this mostly because America is supposed to be the land of opportunity. If a person moves here set on being a leader and works hard to get there, even if they're weren't born here, I don't think they should be denied that opportunity. It is a very fine line because on one hand, if a person moved here when they were five years old, that's close enough to being born here that they shouldn't be denied. It is hard to say if anyone is wanting to be in such a high position to use the powers in a questionable way, American or not. Americans are just as capable as non-Americans to corrupt the government however they wish. It's certainly something to be careful about, and I know Americans will be. They are already bashing Obama for being a communist, a foreigner, a terrorist, etc. and he WAS born in America.

Pardoning

If I were the President, I think I would use the pardoning option but in a limited way. Most likely, all of the cases coming through have gone through courts and courts of deciding their punishment. Therefore, I think that those who came to the decision of their punishment had a reason for making it what it is. Of course there are going to be some mishaps here and there but assigning punishments are these judges official jobs, and hopefully they know what they're doing. If they don't, or if they make a huge mistake then they shouldn't be allowed the right to hold the position. I think it's certainly worth looking over the cases because it can never hurt to check on the other systems of governments. However, I don't think its necessary for Presidents to be handing out pardons left and right. If it's necessary to give out hundreds of pardons each year or couple of years, then maybe the President (and a committee) should be checking the judges who made the punishment decisions, not the criminals. Initially, that's where the problem is coming from and they are not going to be writing in biased letters begging the President to free them, like the criminals.

Most Important Helper

First of all, I think the most important helper to the president is going to differ from each term to the next, and from one president to another depending on who it is. For this specific election and time period, I think the Economic and Security advisers are going to be really helpful for President Elect Barack Obama. These were two of the most important parts of the election, and are very important in America right now because of the recent problems with the economy. This is going to be this first thing on Obamas mind, therefore he is going to be needing advise from them regularly. However, throughout his term in general I think Obama will be receiving the most advice from his main Staff (Vice president, Speaker of House, etc) They all have lots of experience in different aspects that he may not have, and he will hopefully take full advantage of that. I think he seems to work with these people frequently, and will look to them because they are so high up in the rankings of government.

ELECTION!!!

Well, I had a really great time staying up to watch the election. I just stayed on CNN.com all night and was refreshing the page every 30 seconds probably. It was really interesting to see the number of states that voted republican last year and switched to democrat as well as just which states voted what way. I am very happy Obama won! Despite the fact that he doesn't have as much experience as McCain has, neither of them has experience as President.. and that's the position they are taking on so it would be new to both of them. I think he is just as qualified to be President, as most of America seems to think as well. I do have concerns about the fact that the people who are upset about him winning are REALLY upset. I feel that his security as President should be upped a lot more than usual because he's going to be an extreme target. I personally talked to people who honestly think he is a Muslim and that if you're a Christian you should be sorry because a Muslim is taking over the country and blah blah blah. Honestly, how ridiculous can you be? He's not anywhere close to being a Muslim and I'm sure the people who are saying this don't even know what a Muslim is besides being a different religion that has a bad connotation among Americans. It's sad that people in our country are acting like this, and I really hope Obama lives up to what he has been saying he's going to do and really was the right choice. I know he is going to have to work harder than any President before to gain the approval of those who have fought against him, and at any little mess up he is going to be criticized greatly. I hope he works hard and is able to prove those who don't like him wrong.

GOOD LUCK PRESIDENT OBAMA!!! =)

Also, I just want to add that as much as I dislike McCain his speech after the election was amazing!! If he had spoken that well all along, I probably would have much more respect for him. The speech was excellent, the way he spoke and sounded like he genuinely meant it, and the way he pushed the crowd to move on really shows that he cared. It also really stood out to me that he said he was going to stand behind Obama and offer his help and support throughout his presidency.. and isn't what it's all about? I think by having Obama as President and McCain close by to help when he is needed, our government can be even stronger. Obviously they disagree on things and are going to continue to do so, but certain aspects that McCain knows more about and could advise Obama on would be helpful.

I am also excited that Warner and Wittman won! My father has worked with both of them and knows them, so I have been supporters of them for a while. Even though they are members of different parties, I think it's good to have a variety working for our state.
Overall, Election '08 was a success in my eyes.

Should voting age be lowered?

I do not think the voting age should be lowered. Voting is a privilege and it needs to be taken seriously. It's not something that can be taken lightly because it affects everyone and I think it needs to be done among adults. I know that I wasn't really interested in politics at age 16, and if I had been given the right to vote I probably would have not done so or done so uninformed. Both of those are really bad circumstances and now that I have learned more about politics at the age of 17, I can't wait until the next election so I will be able to vote. I think that by making teens wait until they are 18 makes it more exciting because they have a new right that they will want to use. Just like driving, there is a certain age when it becomes available for a reason, and I think voting is the same way. Students need to be at an age when they care about their future, and realize that they are the upcoming generation that everything going on is going to effect. By waiting to vote, they hopefully will have realized this and then use their privilege correctly.

Are tougher US Immigration laws hurting America?

1st time: No. I don't believe we should just not allow immigrants in, however I think their needs to be a limit on the number per year or so. This country can only sustain a certain amount of people and with the steady increase of American citizens alone, it's not going to be able to handle an absurd amount of immigrants too. They are important to our economy, but they can't be subjected to take it over either. People need to be able to appreciate America, and I think if you are not rightfully an American citizen, you should have to work to become one.
2nd: No. I don't think being popular should be a main concern of America. Sure, we should stay on decent to good terms with as many countries as we can, but being the most popular nation is less important than being a stable and influential country. We have become a world where going from country to country is a high risk situation, and we need to be aware of that. Therefore,although these tough immigrant laws have made Americans traveling situation more difficult, It's better to be safe than sorry.
3rd: No. I don't think the US is at risk of 'isolating itself as an economy' just because the laws are a little tougher. I think laws are going to have to be tougher in a lot of countries because more and more people seem to find the desire to go around them. The 'American Dream' and the opportunities should be more important to an immigrant wanting to come to America than the challenging laws. If the immigrant is willing to go through the process even if it takes effort, then in my eyes they are fit to come to this country, live on American land, and be allowed everything America has to offer. I think the process is what is going to weed out those who should be allowed in and those who shouldn't.

Palin Rally

Well, I guess the Palin Rally went as well as a McCain-Palin rally can go for an Obama supporter... It was hard to hear them say such radical crazy things (that he's a communist/socialist/terrorist and blah blah blah)about it when that's just not true. I understand people that don't support McCain say some bad stuff about him too, but come on people.. act like adults and stop making false accusations. To go along with that, I thought it was kind of childish how the boo'd him... Sure you can do that at a sporting event because it's all fun and games, but this is potentially the next president of our country. Is it necessary to boo him?? Anywayssss, like it has already been said, the weather was not enjoyable but I think it was a really good learning experience because I'd never been to a rally before. It made me wish I had been able to go to the Obama rally that much more. It also made me that much more excited for the election to be over, because this craziness has been going on long enough!! I thought there were a lot of clever signs, as well as some unneccesary ones.. like "boy scout for Palin" .. ok, and that matters because? Are we supposed to want to vote for her because a boy scout does?

electoral college or no?

I had a hard time coming to a conclusion for the answer to whether or not the electoral college should be reformed, and I still don't think I have come to an absolute answer. While going through the quiz, I kept changing my mind every page and my final answer was yes- which was what the majority was. I kind of think it could go either way though. I feel like the whole thing should not be done away with because the basis for it is very good and there are some key things about the college that are very important. Also, it has been working a very long time now and no one has changed it so it can't be that bad right? It has only messed up once in the last how many years, and I think that's pretty decent. However, there is always room for improvement and I'm sure there is some way we can change the college so that there is never any error... I'm just not quite sure how. I feel that if there was an extremely important change that needed to be made it would have been done already, so whenever someone comes up with a better way to do this then it could be reviewed.

to regulate or not to regulate?

I accidentally posted this in my senior exhibit and just noticed.... so here it is again.

I think this is a very good debate and could easily go both ways. My initial thought is that government should not be able to regulate interest groups because that kind of defeats the purpose of them. They are intended to make a change in the people's affects on the government. That being said, if they regulate them and disapprove of stuff they are trying to do, then they it's a government group-not a group of the people. However, I think they should almost originally be approved by the government because no regulation makes it possible for people to create absolutely absurd interest groups. Granted, they probably wont get much participation, but they still should not be formed if they are going to be dangerous or extremely hurtful/harmful.

Obama vs. McCain?

If I could vote in the upcoming election, I would vote for Barack Obama... because he seems to be the much lesser of two evils.
Although he may not have as much hands on experience as McCain, he still has been able to study the patterns of political history, and can learn just as much from it. He's younger, fresher, and I think he has more up to date ideas for the future of our country. I also agree much more with the way he wants to handle issues in our government. He knows how to address problems, and is an excellent public speaker. I think he has fresh ideas about how to handle aspects of our country-- for example, how he wants to improve education so everyone is able to go to college, improve math and sciences because they are so important, etc.
Also, I would say one of the main reasons I became a Obama supporter is because I really dislike McCain. He's old, has cancer, and his VP (who would be our president if something were to happen to him) is awful. Not only this, but he isn't a strong public speaker, he doesn't seem to have anything new to address or change and he thinks the American people are his 'friends', not people that he should be working for. Some of his ideas seem absurd- in education, how does he expect to let every family choose where they would like to send their child without having one school overflowing with kids and the next not have anyone. How does he think we were going to have enough 'clean coal' to be an efficient resource when there isn't even such a thing as 'clean coal'? I think Obama is the smarter choice for the future of our country, and even though he may not be perfect he's better than Mccain in my eyes.

Just realized I never posted this..

since the attachment didn't work, here's the link:
http://www.mccainfreewhitehouse.org/


I think this ad has a really different take on the whole election. It's not talking straight to the voters, but to kids too young to vote and trying to get them to convince there parents. I've never seen this done before, and think it's a pretty interesting tactic. Kids like to have there parents see their side of things, and agree with them. Since I've already had discussions on my opinions about who my parents should vote for, I think it's neat they're trying to get other students to do the same. This video comes from moveon.org which has the whole website designated to how you can have "the talk" with your parents about them not voting for John McCain. It tells you what to say when they say things like 'But Obama wants to raise taxes", etc. Overall, I think its a pretty neat concept.

Pres Debates #2

Well, to start off... I will quote Kevin Carmony (don't know who he is.. but he had my exact thought) :
"If I hear John McCain say "my friends" one more time, I think I'll have to turn off the TV and Radio until it's safe to come back out again."


Anyways,
This debate was kind of hard to watch. I noticed that my Dad wasn't even watching it about half way through, and when I asked why he just replied that he had to turn it off because he couldn't take anymore of it. I think both candidates could have 'stepped their game up' on this one, and taken the opportunity to really address the serious questions American people have about our economy right now. They need to show to us the SPECIFIC things they will do in order to improve things, and that it makes them the better candidate. It's not all about making the other one seem worse, because right now neither of them are the perfect person for the job in my eyes. This is such a serious election too, and we need to be able to put faith that one of them can keep our country from crashing. It seemed that almost all of the people in the forum asked similar questions, just re worded but all revolving around if America can overcome this economic crisis. This is obviously what's on everyone's mind and they need to address this.

And let me just add that I CANT wait to see the SNL skit for this one :)
the VP debate skit is pretty good too if you havent already seen it..

VP Debate

I think both VP's did a good job of speaking and properly represented their candidates. I am still on the side of Biden because he is voicing the things I am in favor of, but Palin still did a much better job than I was expecting.

I found this debate harder to watch and stay interested in because of the fact that they are just re saying what the candidates did during their debate. Neither of them made it especially exciting, and I think they went back and forth at each other (or just saying how the other one was wrong because of this, and what they're doing is right because of this) and it just made it unpleasant. In my opinion, Palin tried too hard to fit in and make herself part of the middle class/soccer mom ideal, which I don't think is the case. You have to have at least money to get that high in politics, and she may not have as much as anyone else in these positions, but she certainly seems to have more than the average american. I also found it interesting that Palin said flat out that she wasn't going to answer the questions asked, but just revoke what he said and show how she's right, he's wrong.
Overall, I think it was a strong debate but hard to say if one did better than the other simply because Palin's performance was so much stronger than anyone anticipated.

poltical cartoon

This cartoon is definitely political humor because they are making fun of the fact that Palin's daughter is pregnant as a teenager, and Palin/McCain advocate pro life. This goes along with the ideas that there should not be sex education in schools, advocating abstinence, etc. It makes a point that she's a hypocrite for saying all this stuff and then having this problem in her own family.

Energy/Environment

Just based on the issue of energy and environment, I would vote for Obama.
I would do this because I don't agree with McCain's beliefs on having "clean coal" or on drilling in Alaska/our country. I do think that we should become less dependable on foreign oils, but that doesn't mean we have to ruin our country to get there. We need to focus on alternate resources and I believe Obama has a better plan for implementing this. He is doing some similar things to what McCain wants to do such as in tax credits, etc. which I do believe are somewhat necessary because we have to make our country WANT to help our environment, and by offering things to them if they take a step in the right direction will help this.

typology

After taking the typology test, my results were liberal.
I agree that I am this.. I am pretty open to new ideas and new things and typically go along with many of the liberal/democratic ideas.
It didn't really surprise me.. I believe i took this quiz a year or two ago and got the same thing. But, it's nice to see that I actually have a stand/ side on some of the issues raised in the test that i hadn't really thought about. I had sided with things and feelings about them that I had never known because Id never tested them.

election issues

I think some of the very important issues in this election are obviously gas prices, but also global warming/environment issues. Gas prices affect everyone in the country, and as much as people would like to limit their driving or stop driving at all it's just not something that's logically going to happen. For instance, my mom wouldn't be able to get to work (she works at Reagan Nat'l Airport) and I wouldn't be able to get to school with living 45 mins away. There needs to be something that we can do to be able to live our lives and not go into debt trying to pay for gas. I think it really needs to be put into consideration for all candidates. Global warming is also a huge problem in my mind. Not all people believe it poses a threat because they may not believe in it, but I think that it's a huge issue. When a part of our world (including living beings) is being put into danger because of our wastefulness, we need to do something to fix it. This is where the government comes in, in finding ways to help and prevent this from getting worse.

McCain

I thought it was interesting how when he told about his ideas, he used the word 'we' instead of I believe.. it makes him seem like he's not only thinking of himself, but everyone who is with him and helping him in this process. I also liked how he incorporated actual people, and used their life stories to show that he's thinking about /learning about the common person and the typical American. I think his speech was very and thoughtful, then he starts talking about what he will be doing as President vs. 'his opponent' saying that everything he does is good, and what he does is but. Ok, this is understandable.. this is what he's supposed to be doing.. but shouldn't he be explaining more about what his actual plans are instead of just saying ' it will decrease taxes'? Maybe this is something you learn about from lots of research behind the candidates that I have not done, but just from watching this speech, you don't get a sense of the individual changes he will make.. just his word that they're going to be good.

Obamaaaaaaaaaa!

After reading Obama’s speech, I think it makes it a little easier to focus on what he’s saying rather than how he delivers it. Certainly seeing the speech you get the whole sense of how he feels, but at the same time you can get caught up in the tone of his voice or what he’s acting out instead of the words. Anyways, what I really liked about his speech was how he is thinking about the true middle class and less fortunate members of our country. He states that our government should “help us, not hurt us.” He has an excellent point here, also mentioning that the average income as gone down during Bush’s presidency, which I was not aware of. Another thing I thought about after reading this is the question many people are asking such as ‘is our nation ready for a black president?’ Although I think we are ready as long as they were the right person for the job, I know much of that nation is against it which I think is completely insane. For a while, I have thought that John McCain was going to win simply because he has the better stats as far as what people have voted for in the past, but to hear Obama make these points about him I hope people don’t rule him out because he is not the typical president

clinton speech

Well, besides the fact that people are extremely annoying and need to just sit down and let him speak I think this was a strong speech, just questionable.
I'm not sure why, but this speech made me think about how much you can really trust that Clinton truly believes what he is saying. I suppose it could be because I wonder how much money he got every time he said 'Barack Obama' in his speech.. (which was probably around 15 times) I really hope he believes in what he is preaching, but no one will ever really know if he's just doing it for the campaign. If he was lying, it was certainly believable because he appeared to sincerely mean it, but he's had enough practice in politics, speeches and being in the public eye to be able to cover things up. Another thing I was wondering, is whether or not this will even have that much of an influence on how people will vote. I imagine there are some die hard Clinton fans that will just vote for Obama because he supports him, but I wonder if there is anyone who was on the fence on who to vote for before and decided by listening to this speech. Clinton wasn't known as being an amazing president (at least through my understanding) because of the scandals he was in until Bush came into office and people saw how much worse things could be, so how influential is he now?